Please, let us stop using the word “spill,” a PR term.  It’s not a spill. Ironically, we continue to fund wars of choice propping up big oil, such as BP, in far away lands (and maybe, almost incidentally, round up a few terrorists here and there), when big oil has committed what could be called a terrorist-like assault on our country.  

I do not suggest that BP did this on purpose, though its behavior was purposeful negligence.  Apparently, BP also allegedly engaged in purposeful lying to regulators.  And BP was purposefully reckless and cavalier in the aftermath. Where the administration is concerned, I do not suggest that extensive person hours haven’t been spent by this administration.  They have, from the beginning.  Nor do I suggest that the administration doesn’t care about what is happening.  I think the president has gotten a bad (and very unfair) rap on that.  However, the president has more on his plate than finding the right “ass to kick.”  (I must confess, I hope he does that, through the DoJ.)  

What is needed is a massive re-organization of our national priorities. Given the extensiveness and seriousness of what we face in the Gulf, and potentially up the Atlantic Coast, we must consider some outside-the-box thoughts:

In his journal, David Swanson points out the various things Charlottesville Virginia could fund with the money that small city provides in taxes for the wars.

69,579 People Receiving Low-Income Healthcare for One Year OR

5,871 Police or Sheriff’s Patrol Officers for One Year OR

6,435 Firefighters for One Year OR

36,411 Scholarships for University Students for One Year OR

64,764 Students receiving Pell Grants of $5550 OR

125,637 Children Receiving Low-Income Healthcare for One Year OR

47,424 Head Start Slots for Children for One Year OR

63,840 Households with Renewable Electricity – Solar Photovoltaic for One Year OR

5,055 Elementary School Teachers for One Year OR

170,241 Households with Renewable Electricity-Wind Power for One Year

OR we could defend against the incompetent, negligent contemptuous company, which is essentially “terrorizing” nearly half of this nation even as I write this.

The very same folks (notably John Boehner and the increasingly radical cons he represents), who want the taxpayers to pick up the tab, will squak the loudest if we should re-assess, re-think, and re-prioritize what our nation does.  Yet, what is the point of defending “freedom” (as if that is what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan–in fact the so-called war on terrorism strips us of such)* in far-away lands, when we are fast facing a degraded homeland? If the gusher continues, the distribution of this massive assault via Atlantic currents jeopardizes much more than the eastern US. (Glibly, BP suggests it’ll all be a wash in the Atlantic.)

If environmental degradation were “all that would result,” that would be bad enough. When all is done, unfortunately, the massive assault on our country is likely to cost more lives than the eleven already lost.  If the massive assault on America reaches up the eastern seaboard, an even larger portion of our food supply (the Gulf provides 19% of our fish and seafood) is and will be contaminated.  The massive assault on America will cost billions. And there is no end in sight.  

in the Gulf, there has been only one tanker sucking up the oil. BP has called for a second!  Recall that decades ago when a large gusher threatened waters near Saudi Arabia, every available ship was dispatched to help remove the oil. Meanwhile, we allowed BP to widely disperse the oil making it more difficult to actually remove the massive assault from the environment and rendering the substance even more toxic than it already was.  The dispersant also had the “benefit” of sending the oil deeper beneath the surface, so the massive assault looks less threatening from the air. Of course, enter the airspace to cover the massive assault at your own risk.  BP doesn’t allow it.  As the video of Orange Beach, AL, shows, the threat is real. When will our government, and the pols in both parties enabling it, shift our priorities where they should be: Real homeland defense?

____

* Note: When the radical cons use this term, they really mean the “freedom” to submit to their so-called leadership (which is really about power); the “freedom” to follow their notion of Jesus as explicated by right-wing pastors; and the “freedom” to be conservatives just like them (and nothing else). Of course freedom has nothing to do with any of the above.  Demanding submission gives them away.

**As always, My Two Cents reflects only the opinion of the writer and not anyone else associated with BV.

With the DPVA’s central committee set to meet tomorrow and vote on who is to be the next 1st Vice Chair of the organization, bloggers across Virginia are posting their closing arguments in favor of their favorite.  The Richmonder supports Susan Mariner for 1st Vice Chair of the Democratic Party of Virginia.  Susan has displayed tremendous commitment to growing the Democratic Party of Virginia.  She has the right skills to grow and unify the party going forward.

Susan Mariner has shown the energy needed to fight for all Democrats in every race.  I first met Susan during the Webb campaign in 2006.  Jim Webb’s campaign for the U.S. Senate was far from a sure thing, but Susan was tireless in her support.  It was the commitment of people like Susan that positioned Jim Webb to take advantage when George Allen’s campaign fell apart in August 2006.

The post of 1st Vice Chair is charged with growing the Democratic Party of Virginia.  You can’t do that by focusing just on the easy races.  Susan has shown that she will take on the longshot campaigns that produce upset victories.  Susan has shown that she can work within the Democratic establishment in Virginia while, at the same time, reaching out to new and growing constituencies.

When I decided to support Susan Mariner for the post of 1st Vice Chair of DPVA I also made the decision not to engage in any negative campaigning.  I do not know Gaylene Kanoyton, but from everything I have heard about her she seems to be a perfectly decent person and qualified for the position.  I simply believe from past experience that Susan Mariner is the superior candidate for the position.

What I do find myself compelled to criticize is the element of race that has been injected into this competition by some of Gaylene’s supporters.  I have no reason to believe that Gaylene approves of these arguments made on her behalf, so I would ask my readers not to hold them against Gaylene personally.  

The element of race I am referring to is the idea that the post of 1st Vice Chair is “set aside” or “reserved” for a black woman.  I have searched the DPVA party plan in vain for such a rule, yet there are those who seem to believe it exists.

Consider:

Any discussion of change has to take a look at the issue of race. The tradition of having the #2 person in the DPVA (and the vice mayor of Norfolk, I might add) being black is troublesome to me on many levels. On the one hand, it says that blacks will always be second-best, not good enough to be #1. That hurts more than any non-black person can imagine.

On the other hand, it is a recognition of how far blacks in Virginia have come and how much we are valued by the party and not just as a reliable voting bloc. Somewhere, some new activist in the party can look to the#2 person in the party and find someone that looks like them.

Do I wish race weren’t an issue? You betcha [smiley face winking].  But that’s like wishing race wasn’t an issue in almost everything. I do, but it is.

This example is from Vivian Paige, someone who I respect and esteem, but who I think is wrong on this issue.  I would note that in Vivian’s original post, there is an actual “emoticon” of a smiley face winking at the reader.  It’s hard not to conclude that Vivian is arguing that wink-wink there is an unwritten rule reserving this position for a black woman and that’s just how it is.  

Sometimes we want something so badly that it clouds our judgement and we make arguments in support of our position that really aren’t defensible.  I think Vivian and the other people who are making this argument have fallen into that trap.  I don’t think this is something to wink-wink at.  

I understand that race is an issue and I appreciate the need for diversity in any organization, but most especially a statewide Democratic committee.  But I think that the issue of diversity must be addressed by looking at the committee in its totality.  There should be no individual seat or position reserved for anyone based on race, sex, orientation, or religion.  Individual candidates for any single position should be judged as individuals based on the needs of that position and the individual talents of the individuals applying for that position.  I am disappointed that this is a position that I need to take and defend so explicitly.

I hope that the members of the DPVA central committee will look at the duties of the 1st Vice Chair position and what it will take to succeed in that position and then closely examine the qualifications and achievements of the individuals applying for the job before they pick the best person for the job.

I wish Susan and Gaylene the best tomorrow and I look forward to working with both of them on future campaigns regardless of the outcome of tomorrow’s race.

Show your support for Susan Mariner by joining her Facebook fan page.  You can read Susan’s “Why I am running for DPVA 1st Vice Chair of Organization” at Blue Virginia.

Yesterday, four Congressmen – Rush Holt of New Jersey, Jared Polis of Colorado, Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, and Gerry Connolly of Virginia – spoke for  60 minutes in the House of Representatives on the “oil spill disaster” in the Gulf of Mexico.  Here are a few key points by Rep. Connolly. I strongly recommend that everyone read this, because it absolutely nails both the diagnosis of what caused this disaster and the potential risks to more, mindless “drill, baby, drill” here in Virginia and nationally.  Good work on this one by Rep. Connolly!

*The “thick oil spill” – let alone the overall surface oil spill – is so large, it would spread from “Dale City near Manassas in Prince William County and [go] as far as Wilmington, Delaware.”

*”This oil spill could have been prevented.”

*”The 2009 Government Accountability Office report said that during the previous administration categorical exclusions were issued far too frequently and it could lead to serious problems. Well, indeed, it did.”

*The Dulles rail project “had to go through a 2-year environmental review that cost millions of dollars of taxpayer-funded money for a public project. But ironically, a private oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico was excluded from that process. It didn’t have to do it.”

*”…we consciously decide[d] during the Bush administration and by previous Congresses, frankly controlled by our friends on the other side, consciously to exclude such oil drilling from the regular environmental review that could have detected problems…”

More after the “flip”

*”If this well, this Deepwater Horizon well, had predrilled such relief wells, it would have allowed the closing of the leak weeks ago, but they weren’t required to do so.”

*”…this didn’t happen by an act of God. This happened because of lax or no regulation, regulation we knew was necessary and we took a chance. We took a chance. And we took a chance, why? Because of the almighty dollar. We took a chance because of Big Oil money, making sure that it influenced the process and made sure that it was exempted from normal regulatory review.”

*We’ve lost billions of dollars in fishing, tourism, all put “at risk for a mindless, ‘drill, Baby, drill’ approach…”

*”This happened by virtue of a conscious decision, by Congress’ control, by our friends on the other side, and by the Bush administration to find all kinds of waivers and exemptions from normal regulatory review and from simple commonsense protections in the event something did go wrong, all at the altar of oil exploration and fossil fuel energy dependence, quite frankly. It could have been prevented and it could have been mitigated.”

*Offshore oil drilling in Virginia risks $1.4 billion annually in Virginia Beach tourism alone, plus “the longest stretch of undeveloped barrier islands on the east coast, irreplaceable habitat for birds in the east coast flyaway.”

*Offshore oil drilling in Virginia also “threatens the presence of the United States Navy in Virginia, terribly important in terms of military investment in the Commonwealth of Virginia.”

*The potential for offshore wind power in Virginia “is enormous, dwarfing the potential for offshore oil.”

*In stark contrast, “For all of the sturm und drang in my State about whether we should drill, baby, drill off the shores of Virginia, the entire estimate of reserves, maximum, off the shore of Virginia, with the largest coastline, barrier island coastline on the east coast, is the equivalent of no more than 6 days of oil supply.”

*”‘Drill, baby, drill’ has now become ‘spill, baby, spill.'”  

*”The consequences of that philosophy of unrestricted oil drilling, irrespective of the environmental concerns, irrespective of the need for reasonable and prudent regulatory oversight to protect the public from precisely this kind of unmitigated disaster, have now actually happened because a whole bunch of people in a position to know better put oil ahead of everything else, including the public interests.”

Powerful video courtesy of the Natural Resources Defense Council, where I start working on Monday.  Oil disaster courtesy of BP (“Beyond Pathetic”) and its CEO (“Covering Everything in Oil”) Tony “I’d like my life back” Hayward.

Thanks to Tom Whipple for the Friday “Clips.”

1. VIRGINIA COMMERCE SECRETARY PART OF SOUTHERN TRADE MISSION

2. GENERAL ASSEMBLY RETURNS $5 MILLION TO VIRGINIA BUDGET COFFERS…

5. SENATORS SEEK PROTECTION FOR ATLANTIC BEACHES

6. ‘HANDS ACROSS THE SAND’ PROTESTS PLANNED IN VA.

8. DEMOCRATS QUICK TO CRITICIZE MCDONNELL FOR RAISING MONEY FOR VERMONT CANDIDATE

9. STILL MUM ON ENDORSEMENT, MCKELVEY STARTS PAC

10. CONSERVATIVE GROUP TARGETS PERRIELLO FOR HEALTH VOTE

11. U.S. REP. SCOTT TAGGED AS ONE OF THE 25 HARDEST WORKING CONGRESSMEN…

14. HISPANICS PUMP UP MARYLAND AND VIRGINIA POPULATIONS

16. VA. SUPREME COURT DEALS SETBACK TO ANGLICAN SPLINTER GROUPS

19. CHAOS AT ARLINGTON CEMETERY: MISMARKED GRAVES, DUMPING OF URNS

21. NAVY VETS AID DIDN’T REACH PARALYZED VETERANS GROUP AS PROMISED, REPORTED

The Washington Post reports on a new poll indicating “broad public support” for regulating greenhouse gases.  Believe it or not, even 55% of Republicans – including 32% of Republicans who feel “strongly” about this – favor having the federal government “regulate the release of greenhouse gases from sources like power plants, cars and factories in an effort to reduce global warming.” Who knew so many Republicans and Independents were closet “socialists.” Heh.

P.S. It’s good to see that, despite all the lies being spread around out there by the Kook-inellis of the world, that the vast majority of Americans continue to want federal government action to prevent catastrophic climate change.  Speaking of which, a new study shows that “less ice now covers the arctic region than at any time in recent geologic history.”  But, but, but, wait!  We had snow last winter! Oh my god, there can’t be global warming if we have snow in the winter! (snark)